


Con Game Beginnings

by SteampunkChuckster



Series: Chuck Versus the Con Game [3]
Category: Chuck (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Chuck Versus the Con Game, Chuck fic, Con Artists, ConVerse, Crime fic, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-05
Updated: 2013-12-05
Packaged: 2018-01-03 13:24:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,249
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1070978
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SteampunkChuckster/pseuds/SteampunkChuckster
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Con artist Chuck Bartowski is beaten to a con job. He doesn't appreciate the affront. Now does his rival appreciate his attempt to take that money for himself. ConVerse Chuck and Sarah meet for the first time.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Con Game Beginnings

**Author's Note:**

> AU, ConVerse. This chapter is what starts it all for Chuck and Sarah. The first time they meet. Sparks flying and all that snazzery. Hope you enjoy!

* * *

He should have remembered what Dubai was like in December. Maybe he'd have chosen thinner clothes. Or worn boxers instead of briefs…you know, for cooling purposes. He couldn't stand the desert, even a desert this close to the gulf.

He readjusted the strap of his laptop carrying case over his shoulder, as though it would do anything to help his skin breathe in the near ninety degree heat. Maybe Chandrakant's massive office building would have air conditioning. One could only hope.

_I should have brought sunglasses_ , he thought to himself, flapping the the lapel of his dark gray suit jacket, then pulling a bit at his tie so that his neck could reap the minuscule benefit of the wimpy breeze.

The only thing the breeze managed was to pick up a little dirt and insert it into the corner of Chuck Bartowski's eye. "Ow, son of a—Oh, pardon me, Sir."

_I hate the stupid desert._

Finally, he stood in front of the revolving doors of the multibillionaire's company. Vikram Chandrakant, owner of four of the most decadent, expensive, profitable hotels in Dubai, and a potential crime lord, though no one could peg him for it as he had his hand in nearly every sect of the city's tourist industry. Vikram Chandrakant, owner of roughly forty to forty five percent of Dubai. Maybe that was an exaggeration, but the guy was big.

And if this job went wrong—Well, Chuck would be a body bag filled with severed limbs and organs found floating in the Persian gulf—a snack for any zombie who happens to swim by it.

_Chuck, you're an idiot. Zombies can't swim._

Shaking his head at himself, he closed his eye and poked at the corner of his eyelid under which the speck of dirt lodged itself. It hurt like hell, and he really didn't feel like meeting Chandrakant, or his advisor as the case may be, blinking like a maniac. If that wasn't a tell in the con game…

"Pardon me," he asked the young man at the reception desk. "Is there a restroom on this floor?"

He followed the man's accented directions and headed for the restroom to wash his eye out.

As Chuck stared at himself in the mirror, he thought (not for the first time) of how he'd gotten here. Not Dubai exactly, but here, standing in this restroom in Vikram Chandrakant's building, preparing to sell him a software company that simply did not exist. His professor recruited him from Stanford, a few missteps on a con crew, and he was running—alone in the con game.

He collected himself by breathing deeply a few times. He had the con in the bag.

As Chuck walked back out of the bathroom and down the hallway, he smoothed down the front of his business suit and took another deep breath. He'd chosen an outfit that made him look like the typical Silicon Valley upstart rich kid whose brilliant software scheme after college took off and made him wealthy.

The suit wasn't Armani, but Men's Warehouse. It had a bit of a scuff on the elbow and his shirt collar was cocked a bit, as though he were too big for his britches. As he walked to the reception desk, Chuck worked a cocky little strut into his stride. He signed in with the receptionist then walked back to the seating area to wait. Chuck was so caught up in thinking about his plan that he nearly ran over a middle-aged woman walking purposefully through the lobby.

"Oh, I'm sorry, ma'am."

Her icy blue eyes barely registered him as she brushed him off and continued on, switching the briefcase in her hand and continuing on her way.

"Dang, lady. In a hurry much?" he breathed to himself and sat down.

Fifteen minutes later, his name was called and he found himself on an elevator surging towards the eighteenth floor. The elevator dinged and the doors swept open to reveal an incredibly severe office, with walls that were the whitest white possible, marble floors, and a stainless steel sign on the wall that read "Chandrakant, Inc" in bold letters.

It was nearly silent, except for the hushed voice of the receptionist speaking Arabic into her head-set. She held up a finger as he approached, a small distracted smile sent in his general area, then she concluded the phone call and pressed a small button on the headset.

"You are Harold Beckett?" she asked in perfect English.

"Harry," he corrected with a confident grin.

It was not returned. "Yes, Mr. Chandrakant has stepped out for a meeting, but his assistant Mr. Fakhoury will speak with you. If that is alright." It didn't seem to be a question. Either it was alright, or he could take his software company elsewhere.

"Quite alright," he chirped.

"Follow me."

She led him down the hallway and to a set of double doors with the name Rashid Fakhoury on the plaque beside the doorway. She swept the doors open and gestured for him to step inside.

"Uh, thank you. Thank you very much," he said.

Without answering, the woman left, shutting the doors behind her. Rashid Fakhoury was a short man with a definite receding hairline and eyes that darted around in his little head like nervous mice. "Mr. Beckett. I am Rashid Fakhoury. I am sorry that Mr. Chandrakant is not here. He was called away for important business."

"That's quite alright."

"Good." He made a vague gesture. "Now…your software. Be advised, Mr. Chandrakant doesn't usually like to invest in computer software. Technology advances far too quickly in this day and age. It's unpredictable. One day you have the best product on the market and the next day, you've lost a fortune because an upstart computer enthusiast has stolen your product and marketed it better." He lit a cigar and leaned back in his chair, eyeing Chuck with no small amount of ridicule. "What makes your product worth buying?"

"May I?" Chuck gestured to his laptop bag and Fakhoury outstretched a hand and waved it a bit. "Thank you." He pulled the laptop out and opened it, quickly connecting to the software website he created. It was foolproof. Every link went to a legitimate website that he'd covered with his own company's information. Every IP address on each product listed in the catalogue was a legitimate IP address. Every last thing had been taken care of. Chuck had spent two months on it, creating the basis for what might go down in history as the most elaborate con he had ever pulled, and on one of the most powerful men in the Arabian Peninsula.

Or this could all fail and he'd be killed.

With that thought in mind, he turned the laptop so that Rashid Fakhoury could see it. "The software costs the buyer a pretty penny, granted, but people seem to be willing to pay for it."

"You have buyers? People want this?"

"I do and they do. Only thing is, I haven't really got the head for running a business, you see. That's why I want to pull out and let someone handle it who won't run it into the ground." He snorted in a self-deprecating way. "It will certainly make Mr. Chandrakant a fortune, but it needs a bit of his fortune to really get off the ground. And his head for business."

"You graduated from Berkeley, Mr. Beckett?"

"Harry. And yeah, yeah I did. Me and a buddy of mine, George Monroe? You heard of him?"

"No. Can't say I have."

"He's got another software company. MonLab. Heard of it?"

"Can't say I have."

"Oh. Well, he and I came up with the prototype for BattleBoss when we were still in school. He had the business part of it down and I handled all of the tech stuff—the programming. Well, the idea took off, we got some funding, and sold some shares. And there it is in front of you. But George left the company about a year ago."

"Why's that?"

"He got married."

Fakhoury made a face.

"He moved to London. Didn't want the responsibility of BattleBoss while he was starting to get another software company off the ground. MonLab is huge in the UK. I'm surprised you haven't heard of it. It does a completely different thing from BattleB—"

"Mr. Beckett. You have yet to tell me why Chandrakant would want to buy BattleBoss from you when you seem so willing to get rid of it."

"Oh, I'm not willing. Not at all, Sir. I wish I could keep it going but I no longer have the means to do so. Without a business-minded partner I can trust, I'll run it right into the ground. I have a mind to retire. They say twenty nine is too early, but I don't think so. All I ask is that I get my name attached to the company, a small part of the profit, and Mr. Chandrakant gets the rest. If he'll buy it from me."

Fakhoury narrowed his eyes and flicked his cigar at the ashtray. "You want profit? How much?"

"Not much at all."

"How much, Mr. Beckett?"

"Five-hundred thousand a year."

The man's eyes narrowed further.

"Alright, one-hundred thousand a year."

"That's all you want out of this?"

"On top of what you'd be paying to buy it from me, yes."

"How much would that be?"

"Five million."

Fakhoury's eyebrows raised calmly and he sat forward, putting his cigar out in the tray and standing up. He walked to the window that overlooked the skyline of Dubai and turned back to Chuck. "You want my employer to buy BattleBoss from you for five million dollars. That's a lot of money, Mr. Beckett."

"Considering how much it will be worth in, say, five years under Chandrakant's ownership, five million is almost nothing."

"Is that so?"

"I can assure you that the number will quadruple by 2015. This is big stuff, Mr. Fakhoury, Sir. Very big stuff."

Fakhoury was silent. "You won't lower the number? Say…one million?"

"Afraid not. How's a fella supposed to retire off of that?"

He smirked a bit, pushing the computer a little closer to the assistant. "Please, take a look. Click around. It's a great company. We've got great employees." He then fished in his bag and tossed a folder onto the desk. "There are BattleBoss' records for the yearly sales from 2006 on. All certified and verified by the appropriate government body." His grin became a little cheeky. It was easy to draft up the documents and replicate the seal in the top corner. Forgery was one of his specialties. He liked to think that even a trained FBI expert would believe BattleBoss was a real company, selling real software to real customers.

The man picked up the folder and thumbed through the papers, raising his eyebrows as he read, nodding approval. Then he went to the computer and clicked around the page for less than a minute. "It does look like a secure investment, Mr. Beckett. And the company looks to be doing as well as can be expected, but I regret to inform you we cannot do business at this point in time."

Chuck almost dropped the act for a moment. Well, this was unexpected. "I'm sorry to hear that, Mr. Fakhoury. May I ask why?" He stood up and shut his laptop, shoving it back into his bag. He had to think fast. He had to change the pint-sized assistant's mind. "I've been informed by Mr. Chandrakant that there is to be no more business conducted today."

"Then I'll come back tomorrow!" Chuck answered, grinning easily as he took the folder back and shoved it in his bag.

"I'm afraid not. He has already spent five million dollars on shares in an American company today, and it's left him with a bit of a bad taste in his mouth. You see, he doesn't much like Americans."

Chuck frowned. "Shares? But, I don't understand. I'm offering him my entire company. For that same amount of money."

"I'm sorry, Mr. Beckett. Now, I'm a very busy man so if you wouldn't mind escorting yourself out Mr. Awad will take your badge at the desk downstairs in the lobby."

With a short reply of thanks and good luck, Chuck strode out of the office, a frown on his face. The doors shut, effectively locking Mr. Fakhoury back inside his office. The receptionist hadn't shown up to escort him out. He was completely alone.

Chuck pursed his lips and glanced one more time down the hallway, then inched along in the opposite direction towards Mr. Chandrakant's office.

Mostly out of curiosity, he wanted to know what this other investment Chandrakant made was. But he couldn't help feeling like something was fishy, here. Chuck's first impulse wasn't to distrust people and situations, but he had a prickly feeling at the back of his neck. And he couldn't force himself to leave the situation alone if he wanted to at this point.

He stopped at the door to Chandrakant's office and wondered belatedly if Fakhoury was lying and his boss was actually here the whole time. Of course, if they'd already meant to deny Chuck, why should Vikram bother meeting him? Just let the underling turn him down and he could smoke his cigar and count his money like the Scrooge McDuck he was. Taking a chance, he knocked softly. There was no answer. He wasn't entirely sure what he would've done if there'd been an answer.

He jiggled the handle to the door, finding it locked.

Within moments, he'd picked the lock and snuck in, shutting the door behind him.

He rushed to the desk and thumbed through the papers. He wasn't exactly sure what he was looking for, but he figured he would know it when he found—

"Heyo…what have we got here?" he mumbled, lifting a printed receipt from the other end of the desk. Chandrakant had wired five million dollars to a Taylor Franco's bank account. His eyes scanned over the business jargon and the numbers. O'Connell Insurance. Whatever insurance company it was, they'd managed to persuade Vikram Chandrakant to buy a share in some pricey stock.

Chuck shook his head and put the paper back. Taylor Franco. O'Connell Insurance.

He rushed out of the office and shut the door again, locking it from the outside and rushing down the hall again. "Have a nice day. Stay outta that heat, huh?" he quipped cheesily at the nonplussed receptionist as he went to the elevator and pressed the down button.

If he was right, O'Connell Insurance didn't exist. Nor did Taylor Franco.

Somebody had beat Chuck Bartowski to the con.

}o{

"Two can play at that game," Chuck muttered to himself as he strode into the revolving doors of the hotel. He was sweating a bit from all of the rushing around he'd done in the last twenty minutes since he left the Chandrakant building. _Fucking desert_ , he angrily thought to himself again. _Fucking O'Connell. Fucking Taylor fucking Franco._

He'd never thought that many fucks in such a short amount of time, but then again, he'd never been beaten quite so hard as he was by whoever the bastard was that had conned Vikram Chandrakant before he could do it himself.

But Chuck wasn't particularly worried. It would be easy to find this guy, tranq him, take the money, and be on his way. No doubt _Taylor Franco_ had already gotten the money out of whatever bank the money had been transferred to. That was how it worked in foreign countries. Otherwise the money could be traced back to him and he'd be caught faster than you could say "Bunburying".

His conscience attempted to rear its head but he stuffed it down. Stealing from a con artist wasn't bad. It was a bit of a prick to his pride, granted, as he'd not been the one to successfully con the pants off of one of Dubai's wealthiest patrons…but he'd get over it on the plane ride to London. With five million dollars spilling out of his pockets.

Chuck had gone back to his hotel room and very quickly discovered O'Connell Insurance was nonexistent. A phony, half-assed website had been constructed on a hotel computer in Dubai as recently as the night before. To fool Chandrakant the conman must have made up for a terribly built website by being clinically talented at bullshitting. That left him feeling only slightly unsettled as to whether or not he could outsmart someone with the talent to pull that off. But he'd pushed it to the back of his mind and continued his work.

He traced the computer his rival used and hurried to the hotel where it was located, assuming Taylor Franco was staying there. Spotting the computer cubbies erected against the back wall for guest use, Chuck rushed over and plopped down in front of the one he'd traced the website to.

It only took Chuck a few minutes to hack himself onto the computer with his laptop. The night before, the guest in room 407 had used this computer, from 8:40 pm until 10:13 pm. _Novice apparently can't work a computer if he needed almost two hours to make such a shitty website._

Disconnecting his laptop from the hotel computer, he instead moved to a chair that was nearer the front desk. From there he was able to hack into the system and scroll through the electronic guest list.

"Hmm…Sam Dormer checked in at 3:15 pm on December 14, paid with credit card. Pfft, bet it's not _his_ credit card," he mumbled to himself. "Room 407." Chuck grinned widely. "Got you, you son of a bitch."

}o{

The sun was barely below the Dubai horizon, but weariness had set into her bones, into her joints, into everywhere it seemed. She spent a few minutes waiting, peering out of her hotel window, walking across the room to the door and listening for footsteps, until she finally decided it was safe to change for bed.

Sarah stood at the mirror in the bathroom, peering at the old face staring back at her. "Not bad, Sarah," she breathed, though it turned into a yawn. She picked at the top of the mask and peeled it down, pinching the few last bits of it off of her youthful, beautiful face.

Tugging the severely styled gray wig from her head, she walked to the doorway and threw it haphazardly into the middle of the bedroom. _Damn stupid itchy wig._

Sarah rolled her shoulders and went back to the sink, scrubbing her face to rid herself of the remainder of the makeup that had taken her two and a half hours to apply this morning, including the mask that had made her look thirty years older.

She considered taking a shower, but she was so tired.

And so done with this mission.

It had been an easy take. She'd been quick, efficient, believable. A man like Chandrakant, whose confidence in his own power and influence was his biggest downfall, was an easy mark. But she'd realized quickly that her beauty and youth might be a hindrance in this particular case. Chandrakant wasn't looking for a young lover, or a wife. He wasn't looking for a trophy. Money was his object.

So she'd donned the persona of a well-established, successful businesswoman, good-looking but middle-aged, with a strength of presence that would make him believe her, and then forget her after she left. It had gone swimmingly.

With a satisfied smirk, she kicked off her heels and groaned at how nice it felt to wiggle her toes.

She'd gone to the bank and withdrawn the money as quickly as possible, stashing it in a briefcase and rushing back to her hotel room, checking for a tail the whole time. She hadn't been followed. The hotel owner wouldn't even realize he'd been duped for a few days. And by then, she'd be in Hawaii or some other tropical paradise. Thailand sounded nice.

Sarah eyed the suitcase on the bed and smiled.

Inside of the silver case was five million dollars in cash.

Feeling a jump in her energy, she decided to shower after all.

Sarah peeled her suit jacket from her shoulders and unbuttoned the white blouse beneath. Then she unzipped her pencil skirt and slid it down to her ankles.

There was a popping noise at the window. Sarah paused, feeling a chill running down her spine.

And then she heard the unmistakable sound of a pick turning the lock.

}o{

Chuck heard the satisfying click of the lock opening and pulled the window open, clinging tightly to the rope he'd used to lower himself down to room 407. At least, he hoped it was room 407.

He retrieved his tranq gun out from under his suit jacket where he'd tucked it in his pants at the small of his back, took a deep breath, then leapt into the room.

The first thing he thought was that he'd never seen eyes that shade of blue and he was transfixed by the way they were magnified by the moonlight streaming in the window. Then, of course, there were her long, _long_ and incredibly naked legs, the curves of her torso silhouetted by the moon, and—

In a flash, his right leg was suddenly connected to the window sill, a long, dangerous blade having pinned his pants to the wood. "Ah!" he squeaked, looking down, then up, then down again. "What d'you—?"

Another knife flew at him and pinioned his arm to the wall, causing him to drop his gun. Luckily the blade just missed his wrist and instead got his jacket.

_Jesus Christ!_ He tugged his arm out of the trapped sleeve and spun, nearly missing getting a knife right in the center of his chest. The weapon instead disappeared out of the window.

Where was she keeping all those knives? It was like she was pulling them out of nowhere!

"Wait, wait, wait!" he tried, but had to tug out of his other sleeve and hit the ground to avoid the jacket she'd grabbed and thrown at him. He tried not to be distracted by the blur of her almost completely bare body rushing towards him as he blocked a quick punch to his shoulder and dodged backwards to avoid another one.

"I don't like fighting girls!" he rushed out.

She ignored him, letting out angry little growls with each punch and each attempt to kick him in the side of the head.

"Especially not girls who are—" He blocked a ferocious back hand and got another fist in his gut. "—naked," he rasped.

"Maybe you shouldn't have broken into my _bedroom_ while I was changing then," she said in a dangerous voice, pushing her blonde hair that'd escaped the messy bun out of her eyes. She attacked again, swinging her right arm around to connect with his throat, but his hand surged up to catch her by her wrist. In a desperate reflex move, he tugged on her hard, spinning her back into his front.

"I didn't know you were—Ah!" His hand had inadvertently closed over the warm, soft skin of her belly, so he leapt back and released her as though she were on fire. A foot collided with his temple and he hit the carpet face first. "Oowww…"

Suddenly she was straddling him with her weight on his thighs, pulling his arm painfully behind his back with one arm and pushing his face into the carpet with the other. "Who are you and what the fuck do you want?"

He couldn't remember the last time a woman had touched him like this. That's right…because a woman never had touched him like this. It was disturbing. To say the least.

"Uh…mmmff mf…" She let go of his head so that he could talk. "Thank you. See, I thought your room was on fire and—" Her hand smacked across the back of his head and his face bounced painfully into the ground again. "Ow! What—What is _wrong_ with you?"

" _Me_?! What are you _doing_ climbing into the window of my _bedroom_ , you sick son of a bitch?"

"Now that's not sporting. I never knew my mother."

"Funny guy, huh?" She clambered off his back and stood, her hand fisting the collar of his shirt at the back of his neck and tugging him up so that he was still half-sprawled on the ground. The force was strong with this one.

There was suddenly a blade at his throat.

"Oh, not funny. Nope. Not a funny guy. I'm so unfunny. I'm Dane Cook unfunny," he rushed. This was getting so much more disturbing. "I'm completely at your mercy now, so why don't we just discuss things in a calm fashion…you know, without knives being pressed against each other's throats? Doesn't that sound nice?"

"I don't have a knife at my throat, do I?" she breathed into his ear, her breath fanning his curls there. He tried so hard not to be affected by that, but she was, simply put, the most beautiful woman he'd ever laid eyes on. And even if she were to bring that blade across his neck, he'd most likely die a happy man, just for having seen her. He wondered if she'd let him live if he said that aloud. The blade pressed tighter against his throat, drawing a little blood.

Nope. No, she wouldn't.

"Just—ack—just let me talk. Please? Pretty please?"

The knife swung away from his throat but she kept it in his vision. It was unnerving. "You pointed a gun at me. Give me one reason why I shouldn't kill you."

"I'll give you a couple. I'm still a few years shy of thirty and they say now that your thirties are the best time in your life. Looking forward to that. I've never had shower sex, which—I know, TMI—I guess I just haven't found the right girl, but I'd like the experience some time." His face was pressed against the ground again and a knee pressed painfully into his kidney. "And that isn't a real gun. It's got tranquilizer darts, which means if I'd have shot you, you'd maybe be asleep for about six hours or so. Well…" He looked up at her best he could. " _…you_? Maybe four hours. Three. Or two."

She didn't say anything for a second. "You move, this knife will be embedded in your skull faster than you can bat an eye."

He wasn't a fan of that image.

"I won't move," he hurried out. "I won't."

She let him flop back to the ground and released his arm. He swept it around and sighed in relief, rolling onto his back and keeping his hands up so that she could see he wasn't reaching for any concealed weapons.

Chuck tried really, _really_ hard not to stare. But he had never seen a woman more beautiful than this freaking ninja woman. _This_ was Taylor Franco? Sam Dormer? It made sense. Those were unisex names. He'd just automatically assumed it was a man. Rather sexist of him, he mused. How did a woman this beautiful manage to dupe Vikram Chandrakant out of five million dollars? He felt like a misogynistic jerk for that last thought. Apparently she was more than capable.

She stooped down and picked up his gun. "Hm. What do ya know? It _is_ a tranq gun. Why were you—Oh my God." Her eyes flashed up to him and she opened her mouth in amused shock. "You were gonna tranq me and take my money, weren't you?"

"What? No."

"Yes you were. You were going to climb in that window, shoot me with this, take my suitcase of money, and disappear! You let me do all the work. Then you were gonna knock me out with this and steal my money. That's pretty embarrassing. Considering you failed on top of it."

Even though her words were biting, he could see amusement dancing in her eyes. She laughed a little and a spike of anger went through him.

"You know what? No. This isn't fair. Because I've been working on a con for the last three months to get that five million and I go in there only to find out you got to him first. I worked hard too, you know." Chuck felt like an idiot for letting her get under his skin, but she was right, and he was embarrassed.

"Oh God, come on. This is ridiculous." She laughed. "Are you at least a little embarrassed? Especially since I caught you."

"A little."

She stopped and looked at him. Apparently that hadn't been the answer she'd expected. Chuck was fighting to keep his eyes on her face, although it wasn't as hard as all that, considering her face was definitely the most beguiling part of her. "Well, screw you. That money is mine. It was rightfully earned. _By me_. "

"Minus the rightfully part."

She glared down at him.

"What? It's true. You did kinda con it from one of the wealthiest men in the Arabian Peninsula."

She cocked her head and shook his tranq gun teasingly in the air in front of her. "I'm going to take that as a compliment."

Chuck couldn't help but smile a little. "I have an idea, and it's a good one, I promise. Why don't we split the take down the middle? Fifty-fifty. I get 2.5 and you get 2.5 and it'll be wonderful."

"Uh, no. I take five million. You thank whatever god you want that I let you walk out of here with all your limbs." She paused. "Say, there's an idea." Her knife was brandished close to his face again and he watched her, unblinkingly. "I could keep a limb for myself…you know, for all the trouble you caused me."

"Don't do that. I'll compromise. I get one million and you get four. Bam! Compromising. Contrary to what the United States Congress says, it's actually quite nice! What say you?" He spread his hands out and grinned widely up at her.

"No."

"Why not?"

"Because you did nothing to earn that one million. And I—Why am I even _discussing_ this with you? You're a thief, and a bad one at that." She seemed to notice the way his eyes constantly drifted down, as hard as he was fighting it. So she leaned down and slapped him hard across the face. "There. That's for sneaking into my bedchambers when I wasn't wearing any fucking clothes."

He rubbed his cheek with a glower. That legitimately stung. "Geez, you've got a potty mouth. Wait…bedchambers?" he chuckled.

"Shut up!"

"And anyways, Miss Franco-Dormer, it's not like I came in knowing I'd find a beautiful, naked woman in here. Frankly, I didn't even think I'd find a woman."

She snorted and it was kind of cute. "Yeah, well…that much was obvious. I was able to throw three knives at you before you even remembered you were armed." The goddess stood to her full height again and went to the chair across the room, draping a flimsy white robe around her and tying it at her front. If anything, the way the moonlight shone through the nearly see-through fabric, highlighting her curves, and the way it cut off on her upper thigh, did nothing but have a stronger effect on him.

Clearing his throat, he rubbed his hands together, moving towards the window. "Well, I suppose I'll just go then. I don't even get a million?"

"Hold on there." Chuck grimaced. "Who are you?"

He turned to face her. She was pointing a gun at him, the flirtatious glint he may have imagined in her eye gone, replaced by an intensity that sent a shiver down his spine. He wasn't sure if it was the good kind of shiver or the bad kind of shiver.

She cocked the gun.

_The bad kind. Oh, the bad kind._

"You're not letting me go, are you? You're gonna kill me."

"Should have thought about that before you tried to steal my take. _And_ , by the way, I lost a knife out that window because of you."

"Oh, I'm so sorry. You know, you're right. I should have let it kill me."

"I asked you a question, damn it. Who are you?"

He paused. If he was going to die, he might as well do it on his own terms. And as silly as it was, he wanted to make her smile one time before he died so that he could say "I did that". God, she was so pretty.

"I am the terror the flaps in the night." Her brow furrowed and her lips parted. "I am the gnat that lands in your margarita then sinks to the bottom before you can get it out."

The room was silent as she stared at him. A grin widened his features, then died. "Wait, are you serious? Did you not have cartoons in the cave where you grew up?"

"What?" she snapped in what looked to be an immense amount of confusion.

"Darkwing Duck! You've never watched Darkwing Duck? How about this: Let's…get… _dangerous_ ," he growled, whipping his arm up to his face with an imaginary cape and raising an eyebrow at her.

"I think I should kill you to put you out of your misery." The words stung a little, but if he wasn't mistaken, the corner of her mouth twitched a bit. She then turned her face away, twisting her mouth to the side and purposefully not looking at him. Was she…trying not to laugh?

"The memory of me will stain your heart forever," he said dramatically. "I have that effect on people."

"What, a stain?"

He couldn't contain the short guffaw. "Touché."

She grinned and he felt his heart flutter in his chest. Her smile was quite possibly the most stunningly vibrant thing he'd ever seen in his life. And when it disappeared, it was as though the room was sucked of all of the light and happiness.

"You still haven't told me who you are."

"Does it really matter?"

"No. Not really. Suppose I just wanna know."

"Charles. Or, uh…my friends call me Chuck."

"You have friends?"

A slow smile grew on his face and he tucked his hands in his pockets. "Not many anymore. This business tends to have a rather alienating effect on people."

"Heh," she replied softly without smiling, her eyes drifting away for a moment. Then they hardened and she raised them back to his. He was struck again by their color and the way the moonlight reflected off of them.

"How'd you find me?" she asked, lowering her gun.

He pursed his lips and raised his hands, wiggling his fingers. "These." Then he pointed to his temple. "And this, I guess."

"Your fingers?" she deadpanned.

Chuck smirked. "I'm an expert computerer. A genius, really."

"A hacker?"

"Well, yeah. But—I mean, I guess you can call it that. When I went to visit our friend Vikram, I—" His eyes fastened on what looked like some sort of gray domestic animal, a cat or a gerbil, laying in the middle of her floor. He narrowed his eyes in confusion until he realized it wasn't an animal at all, but a wig. Then his eyes swept over the clothes splayed around the room and it all clicked.

}o{

Sarah watched as his face crumbled into a multitude of different emotions, his gaze sweeping around the room at the clues laying on her floor. She could see every thought in his head, the way he was slowly piecing it together as his brow furrowed, his lips pursed, and then his eyes widened and he looked steadily at her, his mouth agape.

"Holy shit, that was you!" He pointed almost comically.

"Now who has a potty mouth?"

"It was you. I bumped into you in the lobby, but you were…heh…much, _much_ older."

She smirked. She'd been wondering when he'd recognize her. She'd recognized him almost immediately, before she threw the third knife that was supposed to connect with his chest and instead rested somewhere on the ground outside.

Chuck's features melted a bit into a crooked smile, awe reflected in his brown eyes. "Jesus Christ, you _are_ impressive."

Sarah Walker knew she was impressive. She'd been in the con game for too long _not_ to be impressive. But hearing it come from someone else, hearing it come from the inept, yet oddly confident, conman standing in front of her left her with a slight blush on her face. She hoped leaving the lights off proved to be fortuitous this time in that the shadows might hide the blush from him.

"Coming from you, that's not much of a compliment," she covered sarcastically. "All you've got to compare me to is yourself."

He wrinkled his nose at her in an unamused look and twisted his upper lip in a goofy impression of Billy Idol. "Well, yes. Thank you for that."

"Clearly my technological skills aren't so impressive that you couldn't track me. You still haven't answered my question. You're not very good at answering questions, are you?" she asked, propping her elbow in one hand and rubbing the barrel of her S&W along her chin distractedly.

"No. D-Do you think that's safe? With the gun cocked like th—" She glared and lowered the gun to point at him. "Right. Answer the question. Got it." He cleared his throat and folded his hands behind his back.

She had to fight the smile that threatened to crack again. _Seriously, what_ is _this guy?_

What was more, Sarah couldn't figure out why she hadn't just killed him yet. He had an annoying way of blabbering on and on and on, almost like a nervous tick. She would prefer the tick.

And yet…

It was the strangest thing. She knewhe was a conman. He had to be. He'd found her _somehow_ , and she'd gone through a decent amount of trouble covering her tracks. She'd used the lobby computer to create the website, just in case, and she'd made it to the best of her ability in case Chandrakant or Mr. Fakhoury decided to check on her company. She knew the tech stuff wasn't exactly her strong suit but she didn't think it would matter all that much. And distrust of other human beings flowed just as abundantly through her veins as her lifeblood did.

Creating the company was easy. Persuading two men who were trained to pick conmen out of a crowd of its existence was a little tougher. She thought she had succeeded. And she had, to a certain extent.

But she couldn't figure this guy out.

Maybe that was it. She hadn't killed him because he intrigued her. She was curious. He wasn't like the people in this line of work. It was a generalization, sure. Con artists weren't all like Angelina Jolie or Tom Cruise. But a lot of the men she'd met throughout the years thought they were Tom Cruise.

She eyed the man standing in front of her. His tall build wasn't exactly athletic. Well, he was a little. She thought he had nice shoulders.

If anything, he seemed kind of clumsy. If she'd been in his shoes, sneaking into someone's hotel window, she wouldn't have made a single sound. Yet, there he was clicking and clacking, then leaping into the room like it was some sort of surprise party. The only way it could have been worse was if he had yelled, "AHA!"

No, Chuck was not the Tom Cruise type. Nor was he…any _type_ really. He was different. So so so very strange. But the strangest thing was how solidly he looked her in the eye, even when she was pointing a gun straight at his face. There was fear there, nervousness, sweat dripping down his temple; he didn't fight to hide those emotions like others had who'd been at the end of her S &W's barrel. But he wasn't just looking at her; he was meeting her gaze.

And that weird Darkwing Duck crap he'd spewed at her. Even as a kid, she hadn't had the patience for cartoons. Squeaky voices and silly plots. A half-hour of her young life that she wouldn't get back.

"Fine, I'll tell you what I did" he breathed, interrupting her silent scrutiny of him.

Chuck shut his eyes tightly, then opened them again and sighed, his shoulders sagging. He rolled them back and forth, then walked a little closer to her. Her fingers tightened on her gun and her eyes narrowed.

"I broke into Chandrakant's office and found the receipt you made up for him. Five million dollars, eh?"

Sarah raised an eyebrow and smirked. "Seemed like a good, solid number."

"Mmhmm, it is." His grin lit up the room and it made her a little nervous. How did he get his nose to wrinkle like that? Was it unconscious? Did he know how it affected her? Was it all a ruse to get her to lower her guard? Was it working?

"See, I figured your, uh…O'Connell, was it?"

She nodded once, keeping the gun secure against her side in case she needed to use it quick.

"I figured it was a fake company, meaning Taylor Franco wasn't a real person, meaning good ol' Vikram lost himself five million dollars." He let out a soft laugh. "You got him with an insurance scam. Nice!" When her glare didn't go away, his smile died a little and he cleared his throat again. "So anyways, I—well, I'll spare you the gritty details, but I did a lot of snazzy computer hacking, tracked the computer you used to make the phony website, hacked that computer to find your room number, hacked into the hotel's electronic records, found out a certain Sam Dormer was staying in this room, and here I am."

"You did that with your laptop?" she asked. If what he was saying was true, he _was_ pretty brilliant. At the same time, she was embarrassed and more than a little disappointed in her own tech abilities. Perhaps doing it on her own had been a bad idea after all.

He gave a nonchalant little half-shrug and she narrowed her eyes, the beginnings of a smile on her lips. "That's pretty good."

He blushed and she saw it pretty clearly, even in the darkness of the room. Which meant he'd probably seen her blush earlier. She almost blushed again and felt a chill go through her. _What is happening to me?_

"I'm pretty good at what I do. Well…mostly." He tilted his head and gestured at the empty space between them. " _But_ …to err is human…"

Sarah stared at him for a second and unconsciously tilted her head in a mockery of him. "You want me to say 'and to forgive is divine', but I'm not going to say it because I'm not going to forgive you."

"But you haven't killed me yet—"

"Yet."

"Well, since we've established that you _are_ going to kill me, can I at least know your name? Not like I'll be telling anyone." He shrugged so nonchalantly that she wondered if he knew something she didn't. Like, for instance, that she wasn't going to kill him after all.

Sarah still hadn't really decided. And to be honest, this was the most conversation she'd had with anyone who wasn't a mark since she last saw her father, and she hadn't seen him in two years. It had been two years since she'd spoken to anyone without a mask, without playing a part. And somehow, this random guy, this guy who had every intention of knocking her out with a tranquilizer dart and stealing her five million dollars when he climbed into her window, had her talking. _She_ was talking, not Taylor Franco or Sam Dormer, not Georgia Earnhart or any of the other aliases she'd taken on.

"I guess not, huh?" he asked, an understanding look dimming his eyes that had been so bright before while he teased her.

_Why does he even care?_

"Miss Franco-Dormer, like you said."

He snorted and it was sort of cute. "Okay, if that's your story…"

"You don't have to believe me."

"Good, because I don't."

"Good." She turned from him then and walked to her vanity. A small makeup kit lay near the mirror and she dug through it for her lipstick, setting her gun down where she could make an easy grab for it if she had to.

"Do you usually put makeup on when you're going to kill someone?" he asked. "Because that's a little weird. Full disclosure."

She smiled to herself, then schooled her features before she turned back to him. He hadn't moved even an inch, his eyes on her. She took a moment to apply the lipstick, aware of the awkward silence between them. She would use it to her advantage.

"Are you not gonna answer, then? Just let me talk to myself in my last moments? That's not cool." His voice was even, but she detected a hardly noticeable quiver. Chuck was afraid. He was afraid to die, and there was something comforting in it that she didn't quite understand. It was comforting, perhaps, that he valued his life.

Not that Sarah _didn't_ value her own life. She did, certainly. But she felt a warmth when she heard that quiver. He was real, flesh and blood. She'd been starting to think she was dreaming. But then again—she wasn't sure her subconscious would even know how to construct a man like him. He _had_ to be real. But that confused her all the more.

So she quieted her brain and turned to slip the lipstick back in the bag before grabbing her gun and walking across the room. She felt his eyes on her the whole way. "You're a rambler, aren't you? Talk a lot?"

"Not always."

She scoffed and turned to look at him again, fishing in her duffel for a moment. When she produced a silencer, the air in the room staled. "What do you mean by that?" She glanced over her shoulder at him, screwing the silencer on.

She had to decide what to do with him and it was a choice between two options.

The look on his face was stricken as he stared at her hands and the silenced pistol in them. "I—" His voice cracked. "I used to not talk at all."

Sarah stood still, watching him in the moonlight as it streamed in through the window. He was still as a statue but his amber-colored eyes shone like beacons. She looked away and realized her hands were shaking. She wanted to say, "I'd prefer that version" or something equally snotty, but she didn't have it in her. The truth was that she was oddly at ease when he spoke. She couldn't lie to him for some reason, so she kept quiet instead.

_What the fuck is wrong with me?_

Her hand flicked the pistol towards him and he jolted, swallowing thickly. "You really are going to kill me, aren't you?"

"Any last requests, Chuck?" She forced her voice to be chipper as she squeezed the gun so tightly she could feel the grooves of the grip dig into her palm. He was silent as she walked closer to him so that they were standing less than a foot away. He really was very tall. Without quite knowing why, she reached up to fix a curl that fell over his forehead. He didn't flinch like she'd expected him to. "Nothing?" Sarah asked, lowering her arm back to her side.

"Just one."

There was a mischievous glint in his eye and suddenly she had a flash of him producing a gun from some hidden place and shooting her in the gut. She braced herself for it, cursing inwardly.

But that didn't happen.

Instead he smiled a little and gave a little sheepish shrug.

"What?" She cursed herself again for being more than a little breathless.

The mischievousness left his features and he seemed a bit nervous. She frowned when she felt his hand close over hers where she gripped her gun.

How had he done that without her retaliating? She didn't know.

But she didn't feel any less safe than she had before his particularly gutsy move. The only discomfort she felt was from knowing she had a decision to make—and soon. But not _too_ _soon_ , right?

She battled with herself silently, her face masked by the shadows.

His other hand reached out and his fingers curled around her wrist.

"A kiss."

"What?"

"That's my last request."

Her mouth twitched for a moment, and then a full grin swept onto her features. She couldn't suppress it. She couldn't hold it in. She didn't want to. It wasn't a decision anymore. He'd solved all of her problems.

And what a solution.

She pulled her hands away from him, taking a step back and getting one long, steady look at him. He seemed a little dejected by this and she almost wanted to laugh.

Then she stepped up to him again and put her left hand against his cheek, wrapping her other arm around his neck and propping her elbow on his shoulder.

Sarah kissed Chuck softly, losing herself in the feel of his arms wrapping around her. As he opened his mouth to hers, she shivered and responded in kind.

She'd made the right decision, she thought, as she distantly felt the weight of the pistol in her hand.

}o{

A loud banging noise woke Chuck suddenly. He popped up from where he lay on the ground, blinking groggily and looking around the dark room for any hint as to where in the hell he could be. The banging happened again and he spun to look at the door where it was coming from.

"Mm'coming…" he mumbled, getting onto his hands and knees and slowly crawling his way towards the door.

He bumped his head on something wooden along the way…a bed post, was it?

_Where am I?_

The banging stopped suddenly as he heard another door out in the hallway open and muffled voices drifted in. _Oh._

Realizing it wasn't his door that had been the source of the incessant knocking, he flopped back down onto his face. Something crinkled under his chest and his eyes snapped open again. "Mm'what?" he deadpanned, slowly pushing himself to sit again and haphazardly smacking at his chest to grab whatever was attached to him.

_Why do I feel so hungover?_

He couldn't remember drinking. All he remembered was…her.

As he reached full consciousness, Chuck felt a slow grin stretch one corner of his mouth. He was in Miss Franco-Dormer's hotel room.

Now, whoever the hell she was _really_ , Chuck Bartowski was damn sure not a girl existed in the entire world like her. Her sassy smirk was something else. And her blue eyes flashing dangerously when she was going to kill him. And the way her perfect blonde hair fell over her neck when she stood still and swished around her flawless face when they'd been sparring. Well, sparring was putting it lightly, since technically she was trying to kill him.

Had she…Had she kissed him? Chuck inadvertently put his fingers to his lips and blinked. Was he dead? It had been his last request. She'd put a bullet in his brain, right?

_What a way to go_ , he thought to himself with a cheesy grin. But…he didn't go, did he? No, he was alive. She'd kissed him and he was alive. She'd kissed him. _She'd kissed him._

Her lips were incomparably soft and warm. The kiss had left his own lips tingling, his head buzzing. He'd felt a little numb, even. And the way her hand had felt, so gentle against his cheek.

Chuck looked down at the crumpled paper in his own hand and frowned, turning it over to see words scrawled on it. He felt in his back pocket for the small keychain-sized flashlight he usually kept there and twisted the cap, illuminating his own lap.

Muttering to himself, he set the beam of light to the paper and read the elegant handwriting:

**_Chuck._ **

**_Congratulations on not being dead._ **

**_It's been fun._ **

**_Check your underwear._ **

**_…For making me laugh._ **

His underwear?!

Chuck scrambled to his feet and swayed a little, his head still buzzing as he shoved his hands down his pants and into the waistband of his briefs. His fingers closed over another piece of paper and he tugged it out. It was a folded five dollar bill.

"Ha," he deadpanned. "She's sexy _and_ a comedian. Great."

Shoving it into his pocket, he rolled his eyes, trying not to think about the fact that a beautiful woman had stuck her hand down his underwear and he'd been unconscious the whole time. That was too depressing to fathom.

What exactly had happened, anyways—

Realization hit him like a frying pan to the face.

"Aww nooo…." He groaned loudly and turned to flop onto the bed, burying his face in her pillow.

The kiss.

She'd somehow laced her lips with poisonous lipstick or something while he wasn't looking.

No, strike that. He _had_ been looking! He'd looked right at her! She'd walked to her vanity and put it on her lips, then sauntered back to him all seductively while screwing—poor choice of words—twisting—a little better—the silencer onto the muzzle. "Nooooo!" he groaned again, muffled against the down feather pillow. He flipped onto his back. "Chuck, you've _seen_ Firefly! You've seen it! You _idiot_!" he said aloud to no one in particular. "God _damn_ it!"

He could still hear himself request a kiss from her. And the way her smile had made him feel like he was floating. _You dumb ass._

There was a loud thumping on what sounded like a door down the hall. "Open up! Police!" a deep voice barked.

He knew instinctively that they'd gotten the wrong room.

"Shit, shit, shit!" he muttered under his breath, leaping from the bed and wobbling a bit from the aftereffects of the drug she'd administered in the cruelest way possible.

Bracing himself, Chuck Bartowski hurried to the window and pulled it open. Well, at least his rope was still there. She hadn't completely screwed him over. There was no way she could have missed the rope dangling in front of her window. And it would have been easy to just cut it. Then he'd be stuck, for the most part.

But she'd left it.

This more than anything made Chuck grin, even when he knew the police would burst into the correct room in a matter of moments.

He shrugged his torn suit jacket on and crawled out of the window. He easily scaled the wall, gathering the rope behind him as he climbed. The multitudes of names she'd used sailed through his mind and he vowed he would find her again.

He had a beef to pick with his mystery conwoman.

She owed him way more than five bucks…

* * *


End file.
